IFS 313E E-Commerce Introduction

• The IFS 313E course is about emergent technologies
• Programming is taught by examples

Course Structure

• Divided into three areas:
• Emergent Technologies
• E-Commerce Theory
• Web Development with ASP.NET

E-commerce and E-commerce Technologies

• The topic is an introduction to the subject matter

Learning Objectives:

• Understand why studying e-commerce is important.
• Define e-commerce and how it differs from e-business
• Identify the primary technological building blocks underlying e-commerce
• Recognize major current themes in e-commerce
• Describe the unique features of e-commerce technology and their business importance
• Describe the major types of e-commerce
• Understand the evolution of e-commerce from its early years to today.
• Describe the major themes underlying the study of e-commerce.

Defining E-Commerce

• E-commerce is digitally enabled commercial transactions between organizations and individuals
• Components of e-commerce:
• Digitally enabled transactions, meaning all transactions are mediated by digital technology like the internet, web or mobile devices
• Commercial transactions, meaning an exchange of value like money across organizational or individual boundaries in return for products and services
• Exchange of value is important for understanding e-commerce; with no exchange of value, no commerce takes place

E-Business vs. E-Commerce

• E-commerce is not "anything digital" that a firm does
• E-business is primarily the digital enabling of transactions and processes within a company, involving information systems under its control
• E-business doesn’t include commercial transactions involving an exchange of value across organizational boundaries
• A company's online inventory controls are part of e-business but do not directly generate revenue from outside entities
• E-business involves the application of digital technologies to internal business processes and collaborating with business partners, distributors, and suppliers
• Several other information systems are involved, such as ERP, CRM, SCM, and BI
• A firm's e-business infrastructure supports online e-commerce exchanges
• The same infrastructure and skill sets are involved in both e-business and e-commerce
• E-commerce focuses on buying and selling products or services online
• Encompasses outward client-facing processes and transactions that cross firm boundaries
• E-business is the broader concept that refers to the digital enabling of both transactions and business processes within a firm

Features of E-Commerce

• Ubiquity
• Global reach
• Universal standards
• Information richness
• Interactivity
• Information density
• Customization
• Social technology

Ubiquity in E-Commerce

• Traditional commerce is a marketplace that you visit to transact
• E-commerce is available everywhere at all times
• It allows shopping from anywhere, using mobile e-commerce.
• Ubiquity reduces transaction costs and lowers cognitive energy required to transact
• The removal of traditional boundaries and temporal/geographic location is reffered to as a marketspace

Global Reach

• E-commerce technology allows commercial transactions to cross cultural, regional, and national boundaries more conveniently and cost-effectively than traditional commerce
• The potential market size for e-commerce merchants roughly equals the world's online population
• Traditional commerce is typically local or regional, involving local or national merchants with local outlets

Universal Standards

• E-commerce technologies’ technical standards come from the Internet, which are shared by all nations
• Traditional commerce technologies differ from nation to nation
• Universal standards greatly lower market entry costs for merchants
• Universal standards reduce search costs for consumers

Richness

• Information richness is about the complexity and content of a message
• E-commerce technologies can offer more information richness than traditional media like printing, radio, and television
• They are interactive and can adjust the message to individual users
• This allows retail and service merchants to market and sell "complex" goods and services

Interactivity

• Unlike most commercial technologies of the 20th century, e-commerce technologies allow for interactivity to enable communication between merchants and consumers, and among consumers
• Traditional media like television or radio cannot ask viewers questions or enter into conversations with them
• Interactivity allows online merchants to engage with consumers similar to a face-to-face experience

Information Density

• E-commerce technologies increase information density
• This is the total amount and quality of information available to all market participants
• It reduces costs of information collection, storage, processing, and communication
• At the same time these technologies greatly increase the currency, accuracy, and timeliness of information
• Information becomes more plentiful, less expensive, and of higher quality

Personalization and Customization

• E-commerce technologies enable merchants to target marketing messages to specific individuals by tweaking the message to a person's name, interests, and past purchases
• It permits customization for changing the product or service based on preferences or prior behavior
• The interactive nature of e-commerce technology allows businesses to gather much consumer information at the point of purchase

Social Technology

• E-commerce technologies evolved to be more social by allowing users to create and share content in a global community
• Users can create new social networks and strengthen existing ones.
• It can invert the standard media model by users creating content and determining their consumption of content options

Types of E-Commerce

• Business to Consumer (B2C)
• Business to Business (B2B)
• Consumer to Consumer (C2C)
• Mobile Commerce (M-Commerce)
• Social E-commerce
• Local E-commerce

Major Trends in E-Commerce as of 2021

• Voice Commerce (Intelligent digital assistants)
• AI, VR, and AR in E-Commerce
• Cryptocurrencies
• Dynamic Pricing
• Sustainability influences on E-commerce
• Chatbots

Disruptive Technologies - Case Studies

• Uberization of E-Commerce = "everything on demand”
• Disruptive businesses to investigate:
• Uber or Bolt
• Airbnb
• Amazon or Takealot
• Investigate the meaning of omni-channel in e-commerce presence

Data-Driven Website Design

• It's essential to ensure websites cater effectively to their users' needs.

Database Driven Websites

• These type of websites are the best example of a dynamic website
• They source information from a database and displays such everytime the page is loaded
• Pages change automatically if information is updated in the database.
• They are commonly used for large industries
• It includes:
• E-Commerce platforms
• Content Management Systems (CMS)
• Blogs

Data-Driven Websites

• This website design is meant to provide better experiences for user, and caters more effectively to user needs.

Best Website Practices

• Balance the needs of balance the user with an organization's business objectives
• Incorporate user research to put the needs of the user first, to achieve greater engagement and conversions
• Have a interface which is easy to navigate, engaging, and provides the information needed, to increase conversion
• Provide the user with A/B testing, conduct surveys, and gather consumer research to better understand what they're looking for.

User Experience and Usability

• Focus on providing users with an easy to use experience that provides an efficient way to access the information they're looking for.
• It's important to start with gathering existing customer data to to understand who the users are
• Important data to gather:
• key audience demographics such as gender, age, occupation, and geographic location
• audience personas, with detailed information abotu how they search and consume information
• user's end-goals

Strong Website Insights

• Collect, analyze, and leverage strong insights that can be used in data-driven decision making.
• It's important to involve the user in data driven studies
  • Conduct user interviews
  • Include user specific insight that
  • Track user mouse movements
• Gathering user behavior data can be enlightening and can greatly improve a design strategy moving forward

Importance of a Data-Driven Website

• Map and Analyse the Customer Journey
• It allows for collection of all customer sales data and related information
• Determine how to drive for sales
• Measure and Analyse Marketing Efforts
• It allows for investment in the right marketing tactics
• Use metrics that drive revenue and not just impressions and engagement
• Drives marketing strategies
• Grow Revenue
• It allows for accurate marketing and targeted tactics

Why Database Driven Websites Cost more

• Database costs, dynamic websites require databases and ecommerce requirements
• Hosting packages may require upgrades
• Custom database design to suit each website
• Costs associated with data structure and functionality
• Codes are needed for database connectivity, optimization and data processing

Database Driven Website Cost Breakdown

• Database driven websites can be more, owning to database administrative technical costs
  • The design can be custom or pre-existing
  • Database administrator required
• Backups are are essential to the integrity of content
  • multiple backup services are needed, either on or offline

Benefits of Database-Driven Website

• Easier and faster content updates and eCommerce content updates
• No specialized code expertise is required
• It increases the amount of content that can be held and changed
• There is less chance for physical data entry errors
• Data entries are easier to rectify

Benefits of Advanced website Functionality

• Advanced filter options
• Price and Date
• Users are allow to perform simple actions such as commenting and reviewing
• Enables integration with corporate tools and softwares

N-Tier Website Architecture

• Uses the ASP.NET framework, for websites

N-Tier Layers

• Presentation tier: The top-most level, user interface.
  • Translates tasks and results to something the user can understand
• Logic tier: Coordinates the application, processes commands, makes logical decisions and evaluations, and performs calculations
  • It also moves and processes data between the two surrounding layers
• Data tier: Stores and retrieves information from a database or file system
  • The information is then passed back to the logic tier for processing, and then eventually back to the user.

Database Driven Website Architecture

• Requires a "client-server" setup
• Web applications run on a distributed server
• Client sends requests to the appropriate server
• Resulting data is rendered for the user

Creating A Database Driven Website

• Common tasks for database driven websites is inserting, updating, and deleting data
• The following skills are needed:
• building static websites in HTML, CSS, and JavaScript
• writing basic side language code on ASP.NET
• writing SQL
• designing and building a database

Data Access Layer of N-Tier Architecture

• The data layer holds and uses the information related to business layer
• Code must be defined
• This system is useful in ecommerce

Content Management Systems (CMS)

• Content providers use systems in websites to easily update them
• The content is placed and stored in a database area
• Any document can be stored, but storage constraints need to considered
• Performance
• Database size

Basic CMS Functionalities

• It allows for:
• editing existing content
• creating new content
• organizing and managing content